434 The Power of Great Britain 



invited, and, with a favouring opportunity, certain. One of 

 the greatest advantages of the German military system is 

 seldom noticed. It is very little understood in this country, 

 because it is independent of the war value of the army and 

 navy of the country. If it were possible to be absolutely 

 assured that European peace would not be broken for the 

 next hundred years, it would pay the Germans to continue 

 their present system of universal military service. Look at 

 it apart from the uniforms, and guns, and swords, what takes 

 place in the country? Every year all the young men who 

 have arrived at a certain age (which for simplicity we may 

 call twenty years) are called to appear. Those that are 

 physically unfit are rejected. All the useful male popula- 

 tion of that early and teachable age are taken charge of 

 by the country, in what is neither more nor less than a 

 great and well-appointed public school, and, for one or 

 two years, as the case may be, are compelled to live lives 

 both physically and morally wholesome. Their bodies are 

 developed by exercises, their ordinary education, where 

 deficient, is supplemented ; they are taught cleanliness, 

 obedience, and order, and every German, even although he 

 may have been taken from the lowest slums of Berlin, starts 

 fair with two years of healthy and wholesome life, which 

 cannot fail to influence his whole life. 



1916. During their two years' service, the young Germans 

 have been taught, and have been forced to learn, how to do 

 one thing thoroughly and well, namely, the business of a 

 soldier. This fits them for learning how to do other things 

 well, and it is this acquired faculty which makes their services 

 in request out of their country. Our young men have made 

 themselves the equals of Germans as soldiers by earnest, 

 thorough work, and, in a time shorter than that demanded 

 of the selected Einjahriger. If they hold fast to this earnest- 

 ness and thoroughness after the war is over, they will be able 

 to fill all the posts and do all the jobs themselves, and there 

 will be no room for the foreigner. The civil re-occupation of 

 the country will be automatically prevented 1 . 

 1 See Contents, p. xxxv. 



